Stunning trailer debuts for Blade Runner sequel

DAZZLING futuristic cityscapes, washes of neon colour, and Ryan Gosling and Harrison Ford going head-to-head: The Blade Runner sequel looks amazing.

THE official full-length trailer for long-anticipated sci-fi sequel Blade Runner 2049 has finally been released — and it makes for a dazzling two minutes.

Denis Villeneuve’s follow-up, set some 30 years after the events of 1982 cult classic Blade Runner (1982), sees Harrison Ford reprise his role from Ridley Scott’s original as Rick Deckard, a Los Angeles cop who hunts rogue androids.

“The character is woven into the story in a way that intrigued me. There’s a very strong emotional context ... I think it’s interesting to develop a character after a period of time, to revisit a character,” said Ford at an LA discussion panel to herald the release of the trailer.

Ryan Gosling becomes a sci fi hero in the Blade Runner trailer.

Ryan Gosling leads a cast of Blade Runner newcomers including Robin Wright and Jared Leto, who appears to be a manufacturer of the androids — or “replicants” - of future Los Angeles, and opens the trailer caressing a newborn, naked android.

“Every civilisation was built off the back of a disposable workforce, but I can only make so many,” says Leto in the trailer, wishing the android a “happy birthday.”

The footage was praised by movie websites, which noted Villeneuve’s success in emulating the gritty, dust-covered cinematography of the original.

Harrison Ford is back, older and wiser.

But it reveals nothing of the plot beyond the official set-up from the studio publicity, which says a new “blade runner,” LAPD Officer K (Gosling), unearths a long-buried secret that has the potential to plunge what’s left of society into chaos.

K’s discovery leads him on a quest to find Deckard, who has been missing for 30 years.

Gosling who was two when the original came out, told the panel in Los Angeles he didn’t see it for at least another 10 years.

“The first film made me question what it meant to be a human being. It made me question my ability to recognise the hero from the villain,” Gosling said.

Blade Runner 2049 is due for release on October 6.